


Age 18, Freshman Year College

by flib



Series: Nursey Week 2018 [4]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Butterflies as per usual, F/F, Gen, Growing Up, Hockey, Moving to College, Nursey Week, Nursey Week 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-12
Updated: 2018-02-12
Packaged: 2019-03-17 07:35:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13654431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flib/pseuds/flib
Summary: Finishing high school and moving to college was kind of the same as moving to middle school from elementary school. You know, hormones, teasing, thinking you're more grown up than you are.





	Age 18, Freshman Year College

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is a bit ramble-y and unfocused but its similar to the last three in that its a whole bunch of feelings over the year.

Being eighteen was similar to being ten or eleven in some ways; he was a grown up but not, he was changing school and leaving his hard fought for friends behind and he gets to play a lot of hockey and write poetry. Instead of his last year of elementary and first year of middle school, he was experiencing his last year of high school and first year of college which were kind of similar. Middle school and college were both uncharted territories full of phases, confusion and hormones. He was definitely more excited for college than he was for middle school.

Leaving high school is bittersweet, on one hand, he no longer has to spend any more time with his roommate who did nothing but call him a ‘pussy’ and other pleasant slurs but on the other hand, he had a few genuine friends who he’d keep in contact with next year. He’d miss his Lit teacher Ms Cameron who supported his freeform poetry habit, or addiction if they were more honest about it, and provided comfort after a particularly hard day. Unfortunately, he’d have to admit that Andover definitely changed him but whether it was entirely for the better was debatable. He got into Samwell because there were scouts at one of his hockey games because private school hockey was on the radar. Derek was good at hockey, really good and he was happy to keep playing it for a few more years.

The summer was shorter than usual because he was an ‘athlete’ now. Saying that was so weird for Derek, he’d always been a kind of artsy kid and now he was one of those student-athlete memes. The bits of the summer he spent in New York was different from a normal summer too. He still hung out with his friends and his parents when they weren’t working and Farah when she wasn’t busy with her internship. Shopping for the new school year was pretty different though. Shopping for a college dorm was kind of different to his high school dorm, there was like microwaves and mini-fridges and shit along with all the usual school stuff and clothes. By the time his moms finally drove him to college to move in the SUV was packed and he felt like his summer was incomplete and so done.

Moving to Samwell was bizarre. Andover was so close-minded in comparison to ‘the gay Ivy’ and it felt like Derek had the opportunity to let loose and really be himself some ways. The guys he met on the tour, Chris and Will, were on the team too when he got there which he was both happy and annoyed about. He loved Chris and was so excited to be on a team with such a cool person and mad goalie but Will was kind of touch and go, he was moody, frequently argumentative and held some kind of shitty opinions. Derek knew he did too ‘cause no one gets out of high school as a perfectly matured and well-reasoned person with no negative or hurtful views but Will’s seemed to clash with the whole teams’ from time to time. Whatever. 

Derek wasn’t as homesick as he thought he would be but that was probably from going to a boarding high school. It still took him a month before he felt comfortable unpacking his collection of pinned butterflies and setting them out on his desk so he could look at them when he was stuck on an essay or problem set. His suitemates saw the collection and thought it was pretty if a little weird and it was not a thing just like that. His one symbol of hope and family and togetherness was just a cool decoration to his friends and he was okay with that. Chris was the only one he managed to explain it to properly and even then he thought Derek just really liked butterflies and his family which was mostly true but it didn’t feel strong enough.

The only person who had a ‘thing’ like the butterflies was Will with lobsters but it was with the team more than anything. Any time someone saw something with lobsters on it Will got it. They were teasing him for his Maine heritage and lobster fishing stories but lovingly. Even Derek gave him a lobster bottle opener when he saw it in stores around Christmas. It all started with a tiny plastic lobster that Will carried in his pocket all the time for luck. The lobsters were a lucky charm so they were like the butterflies in some way but not. 

So, the first year of college was a lot of things. It was butterflies, hockey, lobsters, literature classes and roadies with the team. It was smoking up with Shitty and getting boba with Chowder and getting new hockey nicknames with all the frogs. Facetiming with his moms weekly was already a routine but ringing Farah almost every day, especially while drunk, was new. He needed to steal her knowledge about school, friendships and dating in college. Mostly, Derek’s first year of college was about growing closer to his actual family while building a new family in his team, suitemates and friends. It was completely the opposite of this first year of high school.

**Author's Note:**

> You know when you get to a certain age in your late teens/early twenties when your birthdays feel weird and unimportant? Is that growing up? Idk but that's what Derek is going through this year. Also, his moms kept getting him butterflies for his birthdays. He has a ulysses, painted lady, clouded yellow, monarch and swallowtail and he loves them all. The monarch was for his eighteenth birthday and is his most prized possesion.


End file.
